Halloween (2018) was lame.

Halloween (2018)

Laurie Strode confronts her long-time foe Michael Myers, the masked figure who has haunted her since she narrowly escaped his killing spree on Halloween night four decades ago. The intro scene is underwhelming, and the theme song is adapted to a less creepy version, meaning that the opening 10 minutes feel flat. Most of the protagonists are obnoxious twits, especially the two journalist dweebs who are totally unlikeable. The first 30 minutes are just dull setup. There are also too many scenes that are structured to mirror the original, which was distracting. The score is neutered to be limp and ineffective, which means that John Carpenter should just retire at this point. It fails to take its time to capture the Halloween holiday atmosphere, and it also fails to set up the characters or the scares properly, which means that it feels rushed even when nothing interesting is happening.

This movie just goes thru the motions and does nothing to distinguish itself or be memorable in any way. The long finale is surprisingly tedious. The comic relief is atrocious. There's a plot twist near the end that is incomprehensibly stupid. On a positive note, a few of the death scenes are pretty good, but I will happily re-watch the much-maligned "Halloween 6" over this one, any day of the week.

The Keep (1983)

Directed by Michael Mann, starring Scott Glenn... this sounds incredibly cool. Check this out, some people are trying to make a documentary about the film that Michael Mann tried to make, but was prevented from making by various circumstances. This documentary sounds a lot like Jodorowsky's Dune (2013). You can read more about the actual movie that was released in 1983 on Wikipedia, IMDB, etc.

December movie challenge - RESULTS

So here are the results of the subtitled/foreign movie challenge and what do you know, the person who proclaims they don't like watching subtitled movies takes the first crown. Congratulations to Tromafreak, because you also watched the most amount of movies, at one per day on average. Hopefully if you take anything from this victory, it's that you won't feel so reluctant to check out a non-dubbed foreign movie in future 😉. Well done!

Also bravo to anyone else who hit around the 2,000+ minutes mark. December can be a busy month for most people and I ended up watching one too many movies with the kids over Christmas so my own performance was pretty poor.. and considering Johan got almost twice as many points at me but at least I wasn't last.. Nicko had a good excuse for getting 0 but Box?! Not one movie, come on, try harder next time! 😉.

**1. Tromafreak - 2,713
2. Gymnopedie - 2,490
3. Foz - 2,106
4. Bloodwank - 2,036
5. OnyxHades - 1,905
6. JohanWOW - 1,411
7. Triggerhappy - 1,088
8. Ballz - 1,085
9. markus-san - 747
10. ZombieCPA - 423**

Box & Nicko - 0

Six Chrono-Degrees of Kevin Bacon (sort of)

OK, not really. But, if you try to go back in time in horror movies as far as you can go, with as few connections as possible between horror actors, how would you do it? What I mean is, if you select a horror actor with a long career, and connect them via one of their early films to a more senior actor who played in that film, and then looked for the earliest horror film you can find with the senior actor, how far back in time can you get? If you allow shitloads of "degrees of separations," of course, you could go back a longer way in time. But, if you try to limit yourself to only two or three connections or degrees of separation, see how far back you can go then.

I don't know if anybody else here would get into this type of thing, but I go through phases where this kind of thing can be really addictive to me.

So, OK, just to start... someone made a list on IMDB of "Longest Film Careers," and it has at least two horror actors on it.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls058627770/

First, Carla Laemmle played the (uncredited) Prima Ballerina in Phantom of the Opera (1925), and she also played a coach passenger in Dracula, in 1931. Then, in 2015, she was in the low budget horror movie Mansion of Blood. So, that's a 90 year horror career right there, arguably. Let me just take this opportunity to pause for a moment at this time to interject the statement Jesus H. Frigging Christ Almighty, that's impressive as hell. So anyway, maybe someone here can connect her through other actors to even earlier horror movies than Phantom of the Opera, if you can think of any.

Second, another horror actor on that list is Barbara Perry, who was in Trancers. OK, so maybe that list isn't such a great way to find horror actors with long careers. Sue me. This is why we should come up with a list of our own.

Who are some other people with long careers, who were in a few horror movies. Dick Miller and James Karen just left us, so this is an opportunity to think about them a little. Hey, Jack Nicholson would be a good one for a list or game like this, not only from The Shining but because of The Terror, and the Raven, both from 1963. Barbara Steele has had a pretty long career too. Elsa Lanchester had a long one too. Anyone else come to mind?

Supertramp in 28 Weeks Later?

This has bugged me for a long time, and I think I might have finally figured it out. In 28 Weeks Later, you know the scene near the beginning, where the US-led military coalition is repopulating London? The kids in the movie arrive on a train, with a lot of other people. If you listen carefully to the background music, you might be like "hmmm, this sounds familiar, haven't I heard this somewhere before??" I think they might have drawn some of the instruments, some of the beat... (I don't know how to express this musicologically, but just some of the music, OK) from the Supertramp song School. The only video I can find of that scene has very muted music, so you might not even be able to hear it, but see if you can hear what I'm trying to describe. It would sort of make sense, actually, because the kids are arriving for their first day in the little colony, and the rules are being laid out for them, like the first day of school. Of course, the kids don't pay any attention to the rules, which eventually results in the entire world being overrun by the Rage virus. Oh well.


Here is the Supertramp song, School. Listen especially to the instrumental part from about 2:13 to 3:17.

Compare Pieces to Silence of the Lambs

I was just thinking, the next time you get in an argument with anybody about whether SotL should be considered a horror movie.... maybe compare it to Pieces? They have a lot of common ground, if you think about it. There must have been some good threads about this here, but, whatever, I was just thinking about it. Probably most non-horror fans won't know what Pieces is, but it doesn't matter. If you describe it, they should see the similarity. And no one would ever argue against Pieces being horror.

Bloopers from 1930s and 40s Movies

This is really cool. And there must be clips from a few Trash Epics, somewhere in there, so this isn't even necessarily totally irrelevant to this site!

Trimming The Fat: The History Of Halloween '18



To some of us, Slasher franchises matter. Maybe it's a generational thing but it's true. The big picture, the integrity of it all, maybe even closure. For some reason, closure is a big one for me. That's one reason why I was never down with Rob Zombie's contributions. Because they weren't. Those movies were remakes, and going by past remakes, this is the obvious kiss of death for a franchise, regardless of how much life it had left in it. A trend that has laid waste to more than a couple of Horror series/franchises over the years. However, nobody ever said they had to stay on the shelf forever. Especially if certain remakes didn't live up to expectations. After Rob Zombie had his fun, I don't think anyone had any idea what was next for Michael Myers. I would have voted for nothing, but Hollywood greed happens to be a thing.So, as we know, nothing can only go on for so long before some asshole in a suit makes a suggestion to continue/remake/reboot a well-known franchise regardless of whether or not the last one was indeed the LAST one. Which reminds me, you're up, Michael!

And I was SO on board with this when I heard they were going to resurrect the original series. And then, of course, reality sets in as it tends to do. The completely predictable announcement that all sequels will be ignored in the upcoming Halloween movie. A new part 2, if you will. Yeah, I don't really give a shit about the Halloween sequels, but this annoys me, just the same. A second chance at closure, but at a price. For one reason or another, the integrity of yet another Horror franchise has been compromised. And now that that's out of the way, time to cheer up because Halloween 2.2 actually turned out to be something special. And yeah, I'm just kidding. They didn't really call it Halloween 2.2. That wouldn't make much sense, would it?. No, they actually called it Halloween, mainly because... OK, then! On with the story!

Remember H2O? Yeah, neither do I, but whatever was going on with Laurie Strode in that movie never happened. Whoever Laurie Strode was in 1998 no longer exists. I thought excluding Halloween II was a bit harsh, but OK! Nothing has happened since 1978. Got it! That one night messed Laurie up pretty good, though. Nothing too bad but enough to make her into a bit of a Sarah Connor with a drinking problem. Laurie Strode isn't doing very well in 2018. Laurie's questionable child-raising tactics have cost her a decent relationship with her daughter, ultimately costing her a relationship with her granddaughter. It's worth it to Laurie as long as she made a difference, making her daughter even a little more prepared than she would have been. Because you never know. You just never know.

Yeah, Michael is alive. I guess he was finally caught later that night, and he's been back in the asylum ever since. No return, no revenge, Michael twiddles his thumbs for forty years. Laurie doesn't give a fuck. She's going to blow his brains out if he ever comes around again. Laurie's daughter thinks she's being silly, but Michael is soon being transferred to another hospital, which isn't particularly great for Laurie's anxiety. Despite not existing in all these other sequels that don't exist, Laurie isn't all that surprised when Michael escapes after a wreck. She's not super thrilled about this, but for the first time in years, she doesn't seem like quite the basket case. In control and prepared.

Earlier, there were some True Crime pod-casters trying to get some words out of Michael, but came up short. Since they had possession of the infamous mask, you know they're going to cross paths again. And just like that, we're able to forget that Michael Myers is a senior citizen, now. After being introduced for a handful of characters that aren't too annoying, we witness Laurie getting her shit together while getting her family with her so she can protect them. Laurie knows Michael is headed for her, but she's going to make him wish he went elsewhere because part of her preparation for this night included turning her house into one big slasher-trap, designed to make things very difficult for a masked maniac who is killing for no apparent reason.

And what a totally uncomplicated premise done effectively as possible. Seriously, well done! Nice, brutal kills and nice touch bringing back the original Michael. Hey, maybe wiping away the past sins of this series is what it took to finally make a good sequel. Laurie doesn't need to be Michael's sister and Paul Rudd's character in part 6 didn't really need to exist. And you know what? It's not always hard to pretend this wasn't Halloween 9, so, I'd say everyone wins, time time... as long as it was the last one and we finally get our Halloween closure. This was the last one, right? 7/10



#Review

Fake Movies that you wish Existed

This should be fun. You know you've watched a movie or tv show in which they depict or discuss a movie, but the movie isn't actually real. Some of those can be pretty awesome. I'll jump right into it:

"Pineapple Express 2: Blood Red" was shown in This is the End, featuring Jonah Hill as Woody Harrelson. B.F.F.F. F.F.F.F.! Rogen also had a teaser for a "Neighbors 3: Zombies Rising"


Ricky and Morty had a few golden commercials for a movie that's in theaters now, coming this summer, titled "Alien Invasion Tomato Monster Mexican Armada Brothers who are just Regular Brothers Running in a Van from an Asteroid and All Sorts of Things, The Movie" aka "Two Brothers", as well as the dystopian "Jan Quadrant Vincent 16" and "Weekend at Dead Cat Lady's House", as well as a show called "Ball Fondlers". Who wouldn't want to watch those?

A lot of people may also think of the fake trailers for Grindhouse, like "Thanksgiving" and "Don't".

Philly fans ought to know the movie Thundergun Express, in which thundergun hangs some serious dong. I'll thundergun the shit out of you!

In the Scream movies, there's a series called "Stab" that's based on the Scream murders, but the sequels spin-off into wild shit, and one of them they mention features time-travel. I'd buy that for a dollar.


Just a few examples. What other fake movies do you wish were real? I remember someone posting a movie and poster for "The House that Fucked Right Off", and that sounds hilariously awesome.

Recent trip to see elephant seals

I meant to post about this here a few weeks ago, but I knew I was forgetting part of the story. (edit: what reminded me of what I had forgotten is the death of Dick Miller, because he was in The Howling. That'll make sense if you keep reading). Over Christmas vacation, my family took me to see elephant seals in their natural habitat, on the coast of California a ittle ways north of Santa Carla, whoops, Santa Cruz.

When I say "natural habitat," of course I mean a small part of their natural habitat. Their life cycle takes them all the way ou to Alaska, and then diagonally across the Pacific. I don't even want ot think about all the plastic they have to swim through. I can't imagine that there will be very many more generations of creatures like that left to see, so I'm lucky I got to see them when I did. Anyway, they are impressive as hell, although they are sort of funny too. I recommend watching Youtube videos, and reading about them online.

I just wanted to mention that apart from The Lost Boys, my mind was affected by at least three other horror movies in the way I perceived the elephant seals and the stretch of shoreline where they were hanging out. The general shape of the shoreline in some places kept making me think of the location of the camp in The Howling, for one thing. That was filmed in Mendocino, a loooong way north of where we were, in Ano Nuevo State Park, but maybe there was something slightly similar about the geology of the area. I just kept being reminded of The Howling, it was weird. I also thought of the Nicole Kidman movie The Others (2001) a lot, because there was a big, isolated, rambling old house on a rocky island visible offshore, where (I think) an old lighthouse keeper used to live. Finally, I thought of the video in The Ring a lot, just because the seals lying all over the beach made me think of the dead horses on the beach in the evil killer video.

I just thought that was striking that I couldn't even go to a nice wholesome outdoorsy park, with family, helpful park rangers, etc, without thinking constantly of demented horror movies with people getting killed in a wide variety of extremely disgusting ways. Had to share.